


Consulting Cat-tective

by Jimlockian



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Cat Ears, Catlock, Dog!lock, Ferret!lock, Fluff, M/M, cat!lock
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-06-28
Updated: 2013-07-21
Packaged: 2017-12-16 10:32:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/861053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jimlockian/pseuds/Jimlockian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John can see what Sherlock's body wants, as much as the detective begrudges himself, and tries to help his best friend like the loyal creature he proves himself to be..<br/>Pool Scene Catlock AU, with Fluffy Johnlock - Cat!Sherlock, Dog!John, Ferret!Jim (bipedal variants).</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Creature Comforts

**Author's Note:**

> Found a new Sherlock-fandom AU - Cat!lock. Immediately had to make a fiction with feline-Sherlock and canine-John. Bipedal version of Cat!lock.
> 
> Credit to Doyle, Moffat, & Gatiss, no copyright infringement intended. Just having fun!

Sherlock prowls around in the midst of the living room at 221b. Circular trajectories always improve his blood flow and get his brain running, but not this time. The feline humanoid's spindly tail twitches.

The tiny imperceptible movement catches the attention of John Watson, resting on the sofa across the room. His dutiful big browns roam over to Sherlock's tail, watching the magnificent midnight fur twirl as the feline strides about restlessly.   
  
The sleek elegant figure of Sherlock is a defined contrast against John's rounder more roly-poly form, but then again few cats live with dogs, so the comparison is not apropos to begin with. That is not the kind of society they live in.

Yet from the first day they met, Sherlock and John took to each other. If anything their differences only seemed to strengthen their relationship. John has duty and bravery like the finest of breeds. Sherlock has a mind every other cat dreams of. Together they are an unstoppable force against crime.

At least they are normally. At present something seems to be distracting Sherlock from getting his thoughts in order. The longer John watches him from his vantage point on the couch the farther down his large ears sag. The canine sits up before too long, tilting his head to the side. “Sherlock?”

“Not now, John, I'm thinking.” Mrowls Sherlock with an irate flick of his tail, snapping the tip up with a motion reminiscent of whiplash. He pauses, standing in place, and lifts his digits to begin rubbing them into his temples. The triangular ears upon his head twitch one at a time while he massages his cranium.

Finally the feline figure stops and drops his arms limply, sighing, “Not enough.” The massaging touch has helped but it is too weak, he needs something else.

John crosses one arm over the other from his prone position on the couch. “I think you need to be pet.” He quietly points out with a humble air as he is already well aware that Sherlock is not fond of physical affection.

“Nonsense.” The snippy toned feline immediately rejects such an idea and rubs his hands further up toward his ears. Maybe the location needs revising, that is theoretically plausible..

“Every creature needs comfort, Sherlock..” This is one of the many times the canine comes across as astute, a very undog-like picture of intelligence in Sherlock's eyes. “Some less than others but that doesn't mean never.” John's honest voice is not pushy with his facts, nor insistent, he genuinely sounds concerned for Sherlock.

The feline knows he really is sincere. John is not a yapping or mad barking sort of chap. There is no other dog that he has ever called friend. They have become companions, living together when most others' eyes would pop at seeing such an interspecies pair roaming freely together.   
  
Still, respecting John's words does not mean he has to heed them. Sherlock remains pinioned to his attitude.  
  
John exhales bemusedly, a soft harrumphing woof coming out with it. “Sherlock, you're standing there, rubbing your own head and ears. It doesn't work if you do it to yourself.”

Over the corner of one shoulder he peeks around, a squinting flash of those brilliant changeable eyes. Sherlock's tail lolls in a circle before slowly reeling from side to side. “Fine.” He grumbles under his breath.

It is only when Sherlock does not move for several seconds that John realizes by 'Fine' the other creature meant 'If you do it.' The dog is not surprised for the feline is full of such ire toward anything yielding to physicality over intellectualism. Sherlock has rarely been pet, at least in the time John has known him. Something about allowing another to stroke so freely upsets Sherlock instead of soothes, except of course the few times Sherlock has let John pet him.

John pushes with his forelimbs, rising to a sitting position as he considers the stiff-spined consulting cat whose back is to him. The downturn of Sherlock's ears is all John needs to see to know that this petting is necessary – if Sherlock's ears were fully down he would be overwrought, if they were perked slightly it would be annoyance, but halfway down as they are now means something is weighing on him. Something that logic itself will not work through, or rationalize out.  
  
Instead of leaping to his friend's side, John carefully pads over so as not to startle Sherlock, who can be a grumpy thing at times like this. First his hand curves on the detective's shoulder, a slow less intimate move that will ground Sherlock. Already a tiny iota of tension dissipates from Sherlock's frame, and when John's hands rise to the black furred appendages it melts away completely.

Immediately a half smile rises to John's round face while his own sandy-brown ears perk straight up. He starts at the junction where the furry ears meet Sherlock's skull, working upwards with supple fingers.

Sherlock tips his head back slightly and closes his eyes, fighting off the purr threatening to form. His tail grows lazy in its wide sweeping from side to side. He barely cares about the slight movement John brings, taking the few steps needed to follow after John without opening his eyes. When the canine pulls on his elbow Sherlock follows and begins to sit down.

John throws one leg on the sofa while the other is splayed, with Sherlock between them. The detective kneeling there with his hands fisting in John's scratchy jumper. His tail barely swivels back and forth, the least jumpy it has been all day. His breathing seems even, and John takes the closed-eye opportunity to watch those pale pink lips part with the tiniest display of a tongue that is likely to feel like sandpaper, as every other cat's does.

Touch has so far been confined to the two fur appendages but John soon begins to expand into the dark curls on Sherlock's head, that mingling bipedal hair. A strangely unifying bond in that no matter what ears or tails they have, their bodies are fundamentally the same – a fact overlooked by most with a dog versus cat mentality.

As John works down Sherlock's head, going along the ears instead now, the feline cracks open his eyes, getting a thin wobbly line of vision. Just enough to see the content smiling face of his canine flatmate while petting him. Sherlock closes his mouth and leans close to John, pushing his high quality clothes against the cottony fibers of John's. The light press of their chests only brings both of them further comfort.  
  
When John adds a touch more pressure to his caresses all Sherlock can focus on is the tangling fingers working him skillfully. A purr thrums through him at last, soft and low like a far off rumbling from machinery. That lax expression, so at ease and unburdened, is unlike his usual alert self, and yet John finds himself adoring both visages without holding them parallel in his mind.

The dark silken strands under his fingers sometimes make John wish Sherlock would allow himself to be pet more often, for though they are few, to John every moment is worth months of waiting.


	2. Ferrearty

After Sherlock's purrs taper off and he unwinds himself from that undignified position against John, the feline decides to return the gesture in kind. He lifts his elegantly crafted digits and kneads into the loppy appendages on either side of John's head. The sandy chipmunk-colored fur is deftly attended by the feline.

Sherlock's lips bear a shadow of a half-smile as he feels, and hears, the signs of John's enjoyment. His fingers sliding underneath to give John a scratch that sends his leg against the couch to wobble. John is softly panting now, and Sherlock does not mind his dog breath. Though, John getting pet is far more usual within their daily routine, it never ceases to elicit such a responsive reaction.

The sound of a familiar jangle coupled with buzzing from vibrations tells them that someone is calling – likely a case. It yanks the two of them from their microcosmic existence within each other. Without pulling away from Sherlock, John reaches beyond him for the mobile phone resting on the sofa's armrest.

“Another murder.” Says Lestrade over the phone. Though normally a professional fellow who sniffs out this kind of action regularly, today it has him down. This is a serial killer of ingenious capabilities with no slowdown in sight. Even with Sherlock on the case each lead has proven more insignificant than the last.

John sighs and nods after the address is conveyed, giving Sherlock a half hearted smile with apology raining in his eyes as he finishes the conversation with the words, “Be there in a tic.”

* * *

 

The victim is a cat-person. A pretty blue eyed white in fact. The attractive female was found behind a dumpster, and even the untrained layman could tell she was not killed there. Police already had cautionary tape around the area, as well as a small swarm of officers, when Sherlock and John arrive.

Sherlock saunters through the group of mostly dogs, ignoring the looks of discontent rising in the eyes of many as he passes. The officers at Scotland Yard defer to him out of necessity, but they bear him no affection, to say the least.

The feelings are magnified as a woman with frizzy curled hair watches John trail after the consulting feline. She snickers to one of her peers, “I bet they don't just play fetch all day.”  
  
John does his best to ignore it, but harping little remarks like that seem to follow the two wherever they go. Sherlock's personality is caustic enough on his own, but add the presence of a dog and he becomes an oddity of circus proportions.

Sergeant Donovan is entirely forgotten as Sherlock turns away from the body, fixing his luminescent gaze to John. “It's him again, John.” Sherlock concludes, stiffening unexpectedly at the realization that the criminal behind this death is the same as many before..

* * *

  
All it takes is some analysis of metal shavings found on the victim's body to tell them where to go next – galvanized wire, not stainless steel. A search of the London kennels with lower budgets cross referenced with a trace element found in some pollen on the victim leads to two choices. Deciding to separate, each taking one location, Sherlock and John agree to text the other as soon as they know whether they are at the proper location are not. The plan was for whomever is there to deal with the situation until the other (and backup) arrives, but it does not go as expected..  
  
Sherlock is walking through the large empty metal prison, an excellent candidate for a place to take and murder someone as it has been out of commission for many years. Not long enough for the stench of despair to have left, but the feline ignores it. The sound of steps causes him to whip his head to the side, instantly alert.  
  
John enters from an off shooting corridor, a heavy parka adorning his slightly pudgy frame, along with a downtrodden drag. “Sherlock!” John begins with a pant, wide eyed with fright as he stumbles from the force of someone pushing him from behind.  
  
“John..” The feline's reply is tentatively slow, as he can easily see something is horribly wrong with his flatmate. Jerky movements, and that expression of fear and blank awe.  
  
Swallowing and looking down to the ground for a moment John tries to firm up his emotions from their state of yawing back and forth within him. It is slow going, and he looks up with barely enough strength to open the parka and show Sherlock the contraption attached to him – an electrified vest. Enough voltage within it to kill him if the amount of hardware on John's chest is any indication to Sherlock's well versed eye.

To add insult to injury whomever has put it on John has added a strip running from the vest to his throat, with a thick, and no doubt also electrified, collar wrapped around his neck. Sherlock suddenly feels an emotion that has not plagued him for years, yet the gun does not tremble as he lifts it toward the sound of another opening door; He cannot afford to quiver now.

Out steps a figure less nefarious looking than anticipated; A bit shorter than Sherlock, hair such a dark brown it looked nearly black in the dim light, with a domed forehead underneath and two shady eyes below that. The ears on his head are so small one may miss noticing them initially, two tiny thin rounded little pepper colored ears. “Jim Ferrearty, hi!” Trills his chipper voice a few registers above both of theirs.

“You're rather scrawny for a ferret.” Sherlock murmurs while maintaining his gun sights on the opposing figure that walks around the empty line of cages. The mesh grating gives Jim an abstract sinister look until he strolls around the corner. So relaxed, his hands in his pockets, a faint shadow of a smile resting on his face.

“It's the suit.” The seams tell Sherlock it is a custom made piece, very expensive. From the back of it comes a thick furry tail starting at his backside in black, tapering down halfway into champagne colored fur. A few looks at his expression tells Sherlock, without a doubt, that this is their killer.

Jim walks around John, intent on ignoring the dog in order to get to his real target. Instead of being bypassed, John jumps on the other man's back and grips him tight. Holding them together would ensure that if John is zapped then the current will flow into Jim as well. “Run!”

Instead of fear or concern, the villain merely snarls out a laugh at John's attempt. Sherlock does not run, he never could have. He would have thought himself a dog for all the loyalty he has, except his only apply to John. A red dot from a sniper immediately has John letting go of Jim, their enemy back in charge of the situation.

“Aren't ordinary animals adorable?” Jim sneered over his shoulder, throwing the comment back at the canine. Yet before their skirmish could be complete the ferret's mobile phone calls him away, and he can do no more then promise to meet them again, soon.

As soon as Sherlock can run at John he does, tugging the vest free and ripping the collar in the back during his haste to get it off his friend. The deadly garment is thrown aside and the two of them escape out of the old kennel as quickly as their feet allow. Within minutes they are in a cab, still in a partial state of shock.

“What you did, back there,” Sherlock is the one to break the silence for once, “.. that was good.” Yet good can barely begin to describe it. He has always known the canine is his only friend, and he is the dog's best out of his plethora of options, but to watch John offer up his life to save him is to see the greatest extent of canine-kind – directed at him.

After the cab ride home that night, too physically and emotionally exhausted to do much else then climb into bed, Sherlock follows John into his bedroom. The canine notices but does not question it, as if afraid that doing so would spoil it.

Sherlock climbs into John's bed and curls up on his side, one ear flat against the mattress. When John climbs in on the other side Sherlock scoots closer until their bodies touch a little. Finding that enough contact, he curls up tighter, using one arm as a pillow, and with that Sherlock falls asleep. John fights to stay awake, to stare at the half-dressed feline in his bed and wonder how they arrived there, and what tomorrow will bring. Partly he wants to etch the image inside his mind in case this is will be the first and last time at once.

Too emotionally drained, John cannot be floored by his bedfellow's presence for long. He drifts off to sleep while still wondering why. John does not realize that Sherlock has been graced with seeing John at his best, and that affects him far deeper than the villain could ever come close to, even with his dangerous morbid antics.


	3. Kitty Cuddles

The next morning Sherlock awakens to find his ear wet.. Apparently John found cat fur not only alluring, but something of a pacifier; He has crawled onto Sherlock's back in the night, leaning on half the feline's pillow to suckle on one of the dark triangular appendages.  
  
That slippery, cool feeling is the first thing he is aware of upon waking. All he can hear is John's breath, soft yet loud from his close proximity. A cozy warm weight against his shoulders and back capture his attention. Rarely is he so intimate, but with John it does not feel disconcerting, even though they are drastically close and with others Sherlock feels at the slightest attempt at closeness. Strange how easy it is to lie here in John's hold.  
  
Yet, having a moist ear is irritating. Sherlock pivots his ear only to find John slurping it in deeper a second time. With a grumble the feline pulls away, freeing his ear, though the sleeping dog inches after the receding source of warmth.  
  
“John!” Sherlock briskly snaps at him, getting the canine to shake his head into a sudden state of half alertness.

John glances around, expecting something more pressing, but only finds himself in bed. With Sherlock. Ah, yes, that was where last night went after all.. His tongue had been lolling out of his mouth and he pulls it back in, murmuring an apology after. Deep browns look to Sherlock, trailing over the slick, wet fur and his stomach turns a pleasant sort of queasy.

“It's fine, John..” Sherlock mumbles under his breath, sounding tired. He preferred waking slowly, and grabbed the sheets to curl them around him (and John in the process). “Just not your mouth.”  
  
“Should we talk about this?” John asks quietly, feeling a little uncertain even though he is enjoying himself. The dog believes that both were too tired to much care where they lay their heads last night, yet waking up like this throws a new light on everything.  
  
“This isn't never.” Sherlock replies with a slight tightening of his frame that John can feel in his back, especially shoulders. The canine may have removed his ear, but that was all.  
  
John ponders that enigmatic phrasing and, per usual with Sherlock, feels as if he is missing the obvious. “Never what?”

“What you said yesterday, John.” Replies that elegant, classical sounding voice with a soft huff of his breath. Sherlock half curls into himself, lower body moving away from John while his back remains pressed to the man's unimpressive chest.  
  
It takes a few seconds before it dawns on John. The beaming grin that takes over him comes from the inside out. Sherlock has agreed with him and complimented him in one breath – it must be Christmas.  
  
The detective's breathing evens out and John assumes he is dropping back to sleep like the lazy creature he often is – a bit like a pirate really, with moments of vivacious energy and then great spells of lackadaisic languishing.  
  
Meanwhile the floppy eared man nestles against his back, feeling the slow, rhythmic breathing of his feline friend. John sniffs him and finds a mix of Mrs. Hudson's detergent, a downy scent from his ears (more so from the wet one), a whiff of acid from his sleeve, chlorine from being near the pool, vanilla and catnip from his shampoo, and sweat.. Fear sweat, the dog can tell. John stopped moving his nose along Sherlock's neck. The feline man is usually so calm, no matter how dangerous their situation – did meeting Moriarty frighten him that much?

 _Or did he worry about me?_ Thinks John, recalling the way Sherlock's face had nearly changed from his calm expression when John had approached rigged up to the electric collar. Without thinking he tilts his chin and captures that dark ear in his mouth, slowly suckling it. _Sherlock was worried for me..._

His warm and fuzzy moment is stopped by an irate, fully awake voice. “John...”

* * *

  
They stay in bed until nine, neither really discussing their peculiar previous day, or the fact that it led them to sharing a bed. Both are unwilling to spoil the moment by analyzing Jim Ferrearty and what he has done to them, especially to John, at least at first. Then Sherlock expends a deep question that has been niggling away at him while they lay there.

“John – why did you do that for me?” Sherlock's tail twitches with the question, and John can feel it. The base of Sherlock's tail is against his stomach, the tip along the side of his thigh, and both thrum gently.

For a moment there is quiet, because it is awkward to say, yet last night John had been willing to do so to give Sherlock a chance to run. “Because you're worth it.”  
  
“That's not adequate.” Sherlock refutes his response even though he can hear the honesty in John's voice. It is just too startling to consider that someone would do that for him. Sherlock has always been a lone creature, and he cannot comprehend why John would be so moved.

“Sentimentality then.” John mutters with his tone dropping as he realizes that Sherlock wants to dig into this, and John would much rather let sleeping dogs lie – literally. He nuzzles against Sherlock's neck and the feline only squirms and rolls over.

Now, facing each other, John takes on a faint blush as he is drilled by Sherlock's acute stare. “Sentimentalism is keeping a photograph.” Murmurs the cat pointedly, unable to relent.

“I wanted to save you, can't we leave it at that?” John holds in his discontent at being needled, trying to ride out the squall this cuddling had become.  
  
“Nobody would think I'm worth your life.” Sherlock sounds acrid, but his eyes have softened slightly in a way that is new to John.

“I do. It'd be a boring world without you.” John meets his disbelief with an apprehensive, self conscious, half smile.

Then his heart tightens watching Sherlock's still confused expression – that is when John realized that nobody has ever treated him like this, so Sherlock cannot wrap his mind around it. John sighs deeply, “Sherlock, I don't care if you're mad, or if you're a cat, or if you leave bloody mice under my pillow, you're still my friend.. I wouldn't have done that if I didn't think so.”

“Yes you would, John.” Mumbles Sherlock gently, “You're a good dog.” John Watson is – he has been upright and honorable as long as Sherlock has known him. His military career is exemplary, and his personality backs up his noble nature.  
  
“No, not for just anyone.” John watches as the bright blues leave his face, roaming over his body.

After a few moments of quiet the silence is broken. “I only left one mouse, John.” Sherlock replies suddenly, sounding critical on the details. He huffs and leans in, face scrunched as he moves intimately against John's chest. Slowly inching closer, to John's surprise. Forehead almost against the doctor's throat, but he does not realize what the cat is up to until Sherlock presses his dry ear to John's lips.

John returns his unspoken praise with a faint smile and a single murmured word of agreement. Both try to absorb their shy, newly dawning feelings, but in the meantime John wraps his arm around Sherlock and strokes his head between the ears while he parts his lips and laps his tongue appreciatively across the silken appendage.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I might end it here. I like the ambiguity of the relationship, and the uncertainty of whether they remain platonic or head into more romantic waters..  
> I might continue this with something, or a new cat-lock, but I don't want to promise given how many other open stories I have at the moment, so I'm declaring this closed for now. I am going to add Cat!lock AU to my preferred prompt list though.


	4. Sherlock's Into The Catnip

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to my new beta Alisha, take-it-away-ernie!!! This is the first chapter she has beta'd for me and she is the reason it is awesome.
> 
> I know I said in the last chapter that this was over... Inspiration hit and these things just happen. 
> 
> ^_^ Besides I just LOVE this AU, it is so cute when you temper their personalities with a species.

"Which dump were you in?" Sherlock asks contemptuously, nose actively wrinkling and scrunching to avoid smelling his odorous canine chum. Asking where is pointless for the cat-tective when it is so obvious – the only problem is that they all smell the same.  
  
John gives him a begging look. He has had to smell himself the whole ride home – with a very irate and reluctant police officer. “I'm going to shower..” He ceases to say much about the subject or the case.  
  
But that's exactly what Sherlock is interested in, “Well, John. Did you find anything?” Sherlock asks while raising a doubtful, discerning eye upon his flatmate.  
  
With a patient sigh his stinky flatmate shakes his head, “The body was clean, not murdered there, just dumped there.. The dump itself gives them nothing to go on.”  
  
Up goes that dubious brow on the feline, and John can feel him thinking that there is always something, somewhere, at a crime scene. When Sherlock continues to stare with distaste John grumbles shortly with his friend. “Sherlock, you're the one who refused to help Lestrade. That doesn't mean I can't choose to sniff something out for him myself.”  
  
Sherlock's eyes narrow and his ears begin to angle sideways, moving back while he watches John walk down the hall toward the bathroom (There is no way either of them would use a licking bath after being stuck sifting through trash of such a stinky caliber). The movement of the feline's tail is the clearest sign of displeasure as Sherlock's face remains a mask while he walks into the living room to throw himself into an experiment.

* * *

  
“Sherlock, are you growing catnip again?” John groans as he enters the room, much as he had done when he found a small potted plant, about a foot high with toothy edges to the greenish leaves, resting on the bathroom windowsill.  
  
Instead of looking up as John enters with a towel around his waist and the potted plant in hand Sherlock's eye remains fixed to his microscope. “It's in the mint family, John.”

“It's also illegal.” John points out with dogged relentlessness for his best friend's safety. His eyes are disapproving and lips firmly set.  
  
Sherlock says nothing more. His friend lets out a deep sigh, knowing that Sherlock's excuse would be something like - “It helps fill in the quiet.” Still wondering how he tolerates the social miscreant the dog walks away to return the plant to its sunny home.  
  
The detective is too busy fiddling with the magnification knob on his microscope, getting a clear look at a compound lifted from the blue eyed, white-furred feline they found murdered days prior. Besides, he has tried to explain the benefits and uses of catnip to John before and knows repetition is unlikely to change an already stilted conversation. No point in a useless response.  
  
Then he catches sight of what he wanted to see more closely. A strange addition that ought not be found in the blood. It is in such fine traces that he barely sees any within the blood sample – but even a few molecules can bring down a body. Sherlock begins sketching the structure and knows that he must visit St. Bart's to determine more...

* * *

  
“That was anticlimactic for us.” Remarks John as they walk out of St. Bart's a few hours later...

Indeed it was, for once the compound had been discovered by Sherlock all they needed was an analysis. With only two manufacturing distributors of the highly classified compound it became a simple matter to track down the perpetrators. Sherlock had found that the dead bodies were all failed test subjects, once he knew what it was they were taking.  
  
Jim Ferrearty.. He must have been contracted by a laboratory for more underhanded purposes. The execution of his plan had been so masterful that if Sherlock had not raked across the samples – samples that police forensics said were clean – then he might have gotten away with it, but Sherlock recognized his touch on the crime like a genetic criminal signature.  
  
Exhilarated by the deduction, even if it is only a mild one, Sherlock has a fullness in his step as they leave. “Dinner, John?”

“Yup.” The feline rarely eats, preferring to keep himself focused while on a case, but now, almost like a reward, Sherlock will eat again. John always encourages him to – partly for medical reasons, and partly because he usually wants a nosh too.  
  
The pair went back to Baker Street, ending their jaunt at their favorite curry house. As it catered to both species John got a dry curry with lamb, popular among dogs, and Sherlock took in a wet creamy curry full of mouse meat. Both had shrugged off the simplicity of the case at the end, feeling accomplished enough in themselves when they walked in the door side by side.

* * *

 

  
That night, long after they have returned to 221b and turned in, John barks himself awake, sitting up suddenly with wide eyes. He pushes back his dog-hair strewn duvet and moves to slightly lean sideways, just enough to let his tail escape and thrum against the mattress.  
  
A noise. Then he did not just wake himself up..

John listens to the still night air with his excellent hearing and there is definitely something going on. Not scratching, but a barely discernible thump. Someone rolling over?

After bemoaning the warmth of his bed for a moment or two John moves to the edge and climbs off. He had better investigate, but he knows they do not have a case on now so Sherlock has nothing to amuse himself with...  
  
Suddenly he hesitates in walking as a thought comes to him. He picks up speed and takes to the stairs with militaristic precision.  
  
As he suspected there is Sherlock in the living room. Worse, as he also expected, Sherlock is writhing enthusiastically on the couch. The man is covered in various strands of yarn, with a hand-held label maker held from a stiffly extended arm.  
  
Sherlock is purring so loudly that John knows it has to be drugs, and when he sees the signs of green under his flatmate's nose he knows it can only be one thing. “Sherlock, you've been at the catnip again?” John groans with his words.

“John I've got to become more efficient..” Mutters Sherlock, trying to wriggle out of John's arms.  
  
“Back to bed.” John insists with the patience of a parent, holding firmly to Sherlock's middle. The man overpowers Sherlock, flails and all, and proceeds to drag him back to his own bedroom.  
  
“But John-”  
  
“No buts, you're going to bed. In the morning you can go crazy.” Mumbles the man as he does his friend a favor. It is somewhere along the lines of four am, if he was not hallucinating. John deposits him unceremoniously onto the bed and takes away the label machine before tucking in the squirmy feline.  
  
“But John-” Continues the detective like a bleating sheep instead of a well minded cat.  
  
“Go to sleep, Sherlock.” John's patience persists as his eyelids drag down.

“But John, I want you to stay.” Sherlock finally manages to finish his sentence without John butting in. He squirms and sits up, ears back, bringing his eyelids back and widening the gorgeous blues as much as he could for some adorable kitten eyes.  
  
John stares at his friend, a dogged tired dog. He just wants to go back to sleep, and if he had to worry about the mad feline then he would never be able to. Staying will make Sherlock quiet down, it will let John sleep, Sherlock's kitty-face is alluringly adorable, but the real reason John climbs in is because he wants to. He expects they will cuddle; Maybe he will get to lick Sherlock's furry ears.  
  
Instead, when John scoots into bed, Sherlock lies down and curls around him like some giant cat-man pool ring. Since John is stuck sitting up, with Sherlock all around him he would lie on top of the man that way, John starts to pick off the yarn, slowly coiling it back up.  
  
Sherlock nips at his hand, more playful than usual. He keeps squirming. First getting comfortable, then feeling a need to shift, and so he ends up rubbing all over John's middle and sides. It is an erotic kind of ticklish, but John keeps that to himself. After all, most of Sherlock's enthusiasm is probably coming from the catnip, making it meaningless.  
  
When John has a thick wound ball of yarn he pitches it over the bedside and clamps his hands on Sherlock, slowly moving the detective off him and forcing Sherlock to curl into a ball. The man starts to lick at his wrist, cleaning and preening himself to channel the extra energy that is slowly ebbing away.  
  
John watches for a moment and, with a dozing yawn, lays down with his chest against Sherlock's back. He curls flush against the feline, pressing his knees to the back of Sherlock's, resting his cheek on top of one of the most gorgeous ears John knows.

The dog slips a hand around Sherlock's waist, and begins to drift off. Then he feels Sherlock grab him by the wrist, lifting his hand and John gets the sensation of a scratchy, dry yet pleasantly frictious tongue lapping across the back of John's hand.  
  
John smiles and snuggles tighter, letting his fingers curl around Sherlock's cheek. The dog falls back to his slumber, contented and deep asleep almost immediately. Meanwhile the feline licks his wrist, fingers, and palm, doing a complete cleaning of John's appendage before just resting against it until he slips off to sleep too.


End file.
